After a week in limbo in a Moscow airport, fugitive US whistleblower Edward Snowden has applied for political asylum in Russia.

Snowden was thought to be trying to get to Ecuador, but a Russian foreign ministry official says the former US intelligence contractor has applied for asylum in Russia.

The official said the request was made late on Sunday (local time). It has been reported that Snowden had given Russian officials a list of 15 countries where he wished to apply for asylum.

Earlier, president Vladimir Putin suggested Snowden could stay in Russia but on the condition that he stopped harming what Mr Putin called "our American partners".

"If he wants to stay here, there is one condition: He must stop his work aimed at harming our American partners, as strange as that sounds coming from my lips," Mr Putin said.

But the president said he suspected Snowden would not stop leaking information, because "he feels himself to be a human rights activist".

The president of Ecuador, where Snowden was known to be seeking asylum, said on Sunday that his fate was in Russia's hands because Ecuador could not consider the plea until he reached Ecuador or one of its embassies.

Snowden, who has not been seen by reporters scouring the airport, has had his US passport revoked and countries around the world are under pressure from Washington to deny him asylum.

Mr Putin, speaking eight days after Snowden arrived at Moscow's Sheremetyevo airport where he is believed to remain, repeated that Russia had no intention of handing him over to the US, where he faces espionage charges.

"Russia has never given up anyone to anybody and does not plan to. And nobody ever gave anyone up to us," he said.

For the second time in a week, Mr Putin said Russian intelligence agencies were not working with the 30-year-old American who fled his country and leaked details of secret US government surveillance programs.

The Russian leader appeared unconcerned about the latest revelations attributed to Snowden about the scale of US surveillance in Europe.

Mr Putin said the fact that allies listen to each other was not Russia's business.